I’ll be spending Independence Day packing for my trip to NorthAmeriCon’17, aka the 2017 North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC).

Now, I know what you’re thinking: didn’t I already post my final schedule a month ago? Well, you’re right, I did. But the Powers That Be decided to move a couple things around and so I’m posting the *new and improved* final schedule, because I’d hate for you to be looking for me at a particular time and place and not be able to find me.

That said, while I have been assured that the times and dates shown below are spot on, the location of things may be wrong. In fact, I’ve noticed that according to the online programming list, the same room has been allocated to different items at the same time. Oops! My advice, ignore the locations listed here and double-check once you’ve arrived on-site.

Friday, July 7th
12:30 p.m. – 12:55 p.m. | Sol | Reading
I’ll read a bit from the sequel to BARSK (aka, the BARSquel), specifically a scene set on an island. Seems appropriate.

5:00 p.m. – 5:50 p.m. | San Cristobal | What’s so Funny?
Humor is a coping mechanism, but it’s also a vital mechanic of fiction. Our panelists talk about humor, and it’s sure to be a lark.with Mel White, Mike Substelny

Saturday, July 8th
3:00 p.m. – 3:50 p.m. | San Cristobal | World Building as more than Background
How does an author create a well developed world? Cultures, government, biospheres, religion, social equity, et cetera must be explored.with Lee French, James Dorr, Ctein

It looks like I’m not going on the Thursday tour of Arecibo Observatory with Brother Guy Consolmagno. I didn’t win that ticket lottery. If you did, and cannot go, and want me to go in your place, hey, why haven’t you told me yet? C’mon, pick up the phone!

Other places I expect to be are Thursday night’s Meet the GoHs Ice Cream Social (8-?). Then on Friday, Tobias Buckell’s and Brother Guy Consolmagno’s readings in the morning (10-10:55), the panel on English Language Caribbean SF (3-3:50), and the Science Fiction Historical Trading Cards presentation (4-4:50). On Saturday I hope to attend the panel on Making the International Move (11-11:50), because hey, you never know.

Elsewise, you’ll likely find me just hanging out around the convention. Come up and say hello.

On Monday, after the convention is over, I’ll be taking advantage of an excursion to visit El Yunque (via Spoon Food tours). Maybe you’ll join me? I’ve written two novels set in rainforests, it seemed like a great time to actually walk around in one.

And I’ve been practicing my Spanish (courtesy of Duolingo), so I’m sure to embarrass myself over and over. If you’re a user of this amazing (and free!) language learning service, feel free to follow me.

Back in 2013, Larry Niven visited EATING AUTHORS to share his most memorable meal, and in my introduction I noted that he’d collaborated with many other authors — most notably Jerry Pournelle, but also Brenda Cooper, Edward M. Lerner, Gregory Benford, as well as this week’s guest, Steven Barnes.

It’s through his collaborations with Larry and Jerry — like the Heorot and Dream Park series — that I first encountered Steven. Of course he’s no slouch on his own as more than a dozen solo novels attests (as well as his own collaborations with his wife, Tananarive Due, and actor Blair Underwood). He’s also written episodic television as well as media tie-in, kicks ass in several martial arts (including kickboxing), and like myself is a certified hypnotherapist.

Seriously, why have I waited so long to invite him here? Wait, that’s rhetorical. Instead, let me distract you by saying his new novel, Twelve Days, comes out tomorrow.

Whenever I’m scheduled to attend a convention, I like to review the list of other program participants to see who’ll be there. Who I know and who I’ve never met before. And who I might check out as a possible invitee to EATING AUTHORS. I tell you this because it’s how I came to meet this week’s guest, Dave Creek.

You may already know him from his short fiction (he’s sold more than twenty stories appear in Analog alone), or from his novel-length fiction (including the epic The Great Human War series — of which Book 3, The Unmoving Stars, came out just over a month ago).

Dave’s bio includes details like being retired from a career as a television news producer, and living in Louisville with his a wife and son. But to me, he’ll always be the guy who showed up at the Nebula Conference and handed a few copies of his work to a relative stranger for a prison library project that I was running. That probably tells you all you need to know right there.

I first heard about about this week’s EATING AUTHORS guest, Bradley W. Schenck, when my editor was waxing delirious at having acquired the novel Slaves of the Switchboard of Doom. The title alone hooked me, as did the editor’s quick description of what it was all about. He taunted me though, that what tied it all together was the illustrations.

Months would pass, but eventually my (and now Bradley’s) editor reached out to me with an ARC of the book, asking if I had time and inclination to perhaps provide a blurb — full disclosure, I blurbed it. And that’s when I saw the drawings and was completely blown away.

Although tomorrow marks his debut as a novelist, his illustrations have been around for decades. Much of his earlier work was done under the name Morno, and I’m tickled to discover he did the cover art for some issues of the D&D apa Alarums & Excursions back in the 70’s that contained my own contributions.

The evolution of his work has ranged from Celtic knots and warriors to the gleaming future of mad scientists and killer robots. I can’t encourage you enough to pick up his new book; you’ll be utterly charmed.

We’re just under a month away from NorthAmeriCon’17, aka the 2017 North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC). If you’ve never seen that name before then all you really need to know is that the NASFiC occurs any year the World Science Fiction Convention (aka WorldCon) is scheduled outside North America. Thus, because the WorldCon is happening in Helsinki, Finland in August, we get a NASFiC this year.

And lo, I have received my final schedule (I actually got it a couple days ago!). I have a surprisingly light load, just a reading and three panels. Even more curious, all of the panels are on the same day and I am moderating all three.

Friday, July 7th
12:30 p.m. – 12:55 p.m. | Bahia | Reading
I’ll read a bit from the sequel to Barsk, specifically a scene set on an island. Seems appropriate.

Saturday, July 8th
11:00 a.m. – 11:50 a.m. | San Geronimo | What’s so Funny?
Humor is a coping mechanism, but it’s also a vital mechanic of fiction. Our panelists talk about humor, and it’s sure to be a lark.with Mel White, Mike Substelny

3:00 p.m. – 3:50 p.m. | San Cristobal | World Building as more than Background
How does an author create a well developed world? Cultures, government, biospheres, religion, social equity, et cetera must be explored.with Lee French, James Dorr, Ctein

I’m also hoping to win a spot on the Thursday tour of Arecibo Observatory with Brother Guy Consolmagno. Fingers crossed.

Other times, you’ll likely find me just hanging out around the convention. Come up and say hello.

On Monday, after the convention is over, I’ll be taking advantage of an excursion to visit El Yunque (via Spoon Food tours). Maybe you’ll join me? I’ve written two novels set in rainforests, it seemed like a great time to actually walk around in one.

And I’ve been practicing my Spanish (courtesy of DuoLingo), so I’m sure to embarrass myself over and over.

My wife is traveling this week, having left me and the dog far behind to frolic with an old friend in the wilds of Montréal, Canada. In past times, she would buy her readmittance to our home with gifts of that city’s famed “smoked meat,” but alas, as both of us have forsworn land-based proteins, that won’t be happening.

I’ve been using some of this time alone to double down on some projects. The new Amazing Conroy novella has been completed and shipped off to my editor. I hope to read from it in September when I attend the Baltimore Book Festival (I’ll be there on the 23rd).

I’m also trying to get a bit ahead on write ups and invitations to the EATING AUTHORS blog. I’m doing quite a bit of travel this summer, and past experience has shown that if I don’t get a jump on this now, I’ll end up with gaps and no time to fill them right about the time I’m heading to out of the country.

Which is about as good a segue as I’m going to manage for this week’s guest, Sara M. Harvey. I actually don’t know much more about Sara than you might find on her wikipedia page, details like her expertise as an award-winning costume designer and a peripatetic life that has taken up and down the west coast, to the east coast, and finally down south to Nashville (which probably goes a long way to explaining the setting for her novel Music City, a blend of Irish myth, southern charm, and the music industry).

But two things made me want to have her here. First, she’s an alumna of UC Santa Cruz, a magical place that still haunts my dreams. And second, the pitch she used for her novel The Convent of the Pure, which was “Half-angel, lesbian demon-hunters in a steampunk universe.” Seriously, don’t you want to rush right out and buy that book?

In a little over a month, I’ll be traveling to San Juan, Puerto Rico to attend NorthAmeriCon’17, aka the 2017 North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC). As you know, Bob, the NASFiC occurs any year the World Science Fiction Convention (aka WorldCon) is scheduled outside North America. As the WorldCon is happening in Helsinki, Finland in August, we get a NASFiC.

I just received my tentative schedule, and apparently I’m moderating all my panels! While some things may change, here’s what it looks like at this moment.

Friday, July 7th
12:30 p.m. – 1:00 p.m. | Bahia | Reading
I’ll read a bit from the sequel to Barsk, specifically a scene set on an island. Seems appropriate.

Saturday, July 8th
3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. | San Cristobal | World Building as more than Background
How does an author create a well developed world? Cultures, government, biospheres, religion, social equity, et cetera must be explored.with Lee French, James Dorr, Ctein

Sunday, July 9th
10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. | San Geronimo | What’s so Funny?
Humor is a coping mechanism, but it’s also a vital mechanic of fiction. Our panelists talk about humor, and it’s sure to be a lark.with Mel White, Mike Substelny

I’m also hoping to go on the tour of Arecibo Observatory with Brother Guy Consolmagno, assuming that fits into my schedule once the convention locks in the particulars.

Other times, you’ll likely find me just hanging out around the convention. Come up and say hello.

On Monday, after the convention is over, I’ll be taking advantage of an excursion to visit El Yunque (via Spoon Food tours). I’ve written two novels set in rainforests, it seemed like a great time to actually walk around in one. Maybe you’ll join me?

I’ve spent the past week recovering from the glorious time that I had at this year’s Nebula Conference. I saw a lot of friends, made some new ones, ate the best branzino of my life, had a couple meals with my editor, made sausage with the SFWA Board, successfully resisted the siren song of all the foods in the hospitality suite that were not part of my current dietary regimen, and even got to talk with an astronaut (my third).

Then, in the middle of my recovery I was contacted by this week’s EATING AUTHOR guest. J. Mulrooney had heard through the grapevine that I’d been trying to reach him and while I couldn’t locate him he managed to find me. And so here we are. Still no sign of Laurie Penny, but we’ve seen meals from rest of this year’s cohort of nominees Ada Palmer, Sarah Gailey, Malka Older, and Kelly Robson, and I hope you’ve been inspired to look at their work.

Alas, I’ve never met J. Mulroney and what little I know is just a disjointed collection of particulars: he was born in Canada, is an alunmus of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he’s been a business consultant in the world of the Fortune 1000, worked for many years as a professional musician, and he insists he once found five dollars on the street. Not a lot to go on, biographically speaking, but his writing strikes me as deliciously quirky, and we’re making tentative plans to meet up in San Jose at next year’s WorldCon. But who knows, a lot might happen between now and then.